[Carisma]

Hello all! First I want to say I just finished installing Ubuntu 7.10 yesterday and I am happy so far, even though I have a couple things I need fixed but the one listed below is my main concern.

1. During boot up my system seems to run really slow and even when Ubuntu is running like there is something running in the background. Would anyone recommend anything to try and increase the boot time and speed up my system.

My system:

e2140
GA-P35-DS4
XFX 8600GT
2gb RAM corsair
250gb Seagate

Thanks in advance!

[Jolly-Swagman]

since it is a new install it may be indexing. do you have beagle installed it may settle down once indexing has finished

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by Jolly-Swagman

since it is a new install it may be indexing. do you have beagle installed it may settle down once indexing has finished

I haven't installed anything since I got it running. Just did all the updates and browsed the internet.

I am currently not at home but I can check when I get home from work around 3pm EST.

What is beagle and how can I see if it is indexing?

[seth556]

Are you using a wireless card or without anything plugged into the ethernet slot? If you are it may be looking for a wired network connection. But when it boots up you should be able to press F2 and see what all it's loading, most distro's it's F2 but Ubuntu may be Esc.

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by seth556

Are you using a wireless card or without anything plugged into the ethernet slot? If you are it may be looking for a wired network connection. But when it boots up you should be able to press F2 and see what all it's loading, most distro's it's F2 but Ubuntu may be Esc.

Yes I am using a wireless card. It was doing the same thing when I had nothing installed before.

[seth556]

Yes but I'm assuming that it has an ethernet port. And if it does Ubuntu will automatically set those up (unless it's some really weird card) and then on startup look for a network on it. As far as I can remember about Ubuntu, you can go to the network manager and tell it to not start the eth0 connection on boot. So when you boot up it will only look for a network through the wireless. But then if you're wanting to connect through the ethernet port you just have to start Ubuntu and tell it to start the connection.

[Carisma]

Okay I will try that.

[th3]

Try if Kubuntu or Xubuntu will do the same thing, or even Ubuntu 704. I think the installer has screwed your install, could be hard to fix. Since you didnt install anything on it yet you got nothing to lose from a reinstall with a different version.

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by th3

Try if Kubuntu or Xubuntu will do the same thing, or even Ubuntu 704. I think the installer has screwed your install, could be hard to fix. Since you didnt install anything on it yet you got nothing to lose from a reinstall with a different version.

I was talking to a buddy of mine that deals with Linux all day long and had him look at my system through remote desktop since I didn't know what I was looking at and he found some interesting things during boot up like 500ms (x4) it was looking for a "eth0" connection that wasn't there. It did that about 2-3 times during boot up.

He told me to shoot him an email and he will help me pick the right distro for me. I thought about Kubuntu or Xubuntu, Fedora or maybe even OpenSUSE.

[VinnyTAMU]

Originally Posted by Carisma

I was talking to a buddy of mine that deals with Linux all day long and had him look at my system through remote desktop since I didn't know what I was looking at and he found some interesting things during boot up like 500ms (x4) it was looking for a "eth0" connection that wasn't there. It did that about 2-3 times during boot up.

He told me to shoot him an email and he will help me pick the right distro for me. I thought about Kubuntu or Xubuntu, Fedora or maybe even OpenSUSE.

I wouldn't give up on Ubuntu just yet. I have had very few problems with Ubuntu and its just so easy to use.

I use Ubuntu 7.10 at work, and starting to use Archlinux at home.


If I were you I would try out a few distros to see what you like.

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by VinnyTAMU

I wouldn't give up on Ubuntu just yet. I have had very few problems with Ubuntu and its just so easy to use.

I use Ubuntu 7.10 at work, and starting to use Archlinux at home.


If I were you I would try out a few distros to see what you like.

I really don't want to but I think it doesn't like my hardware unfortunately. I wish I had my place hardwired in every room then I could cancel out one issue but I just don't. ****ing wireless!

[MRD]

Remove the startup scripts you don't need. Also, build your own kernel and strip it of everything you don't need. That's why my gentoo system boots, literally, in about 1/5 the time the same system takes to boot in Ubuntu, Debian, or most other distros.

There is a tradeoff basically. If you want to take the time and learn to build a kernel, and you build everything into it, then it'll be faster.

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by MRD

Remove the startup scripts you don't need. Also, build your own kernel and strip it of everything you don't need. That's why my gentoo system boots, literally, in about 1/5 the time the same system takes to boot in Ubuntu, Debian, or most other distros.

There is a tradeoff basically. If you want to take the time and learn to build a kernel, and you build everything into it, then it'll be faster.

I would love to learn to build a kernel.

I really don't need anything at startup to run because I can enable wireless when I get to my desktop and I usually never have anything start during the "startup process" anyway.

I really just need the bare things to run and that is all.

Do you know a good place to learn to build my own kernel???

EDIT: I was considering PMing you since you seem to know alot about Linux distros.

[MRD]

Well, I do it all the time in Gentoo but I've never bothered in Ubuntu. The processes are slightly different, so I'd suggest you look up a guide on doing it in Ubuntu. There are probably hundreds out there.

Also, build everything you NEED into the kernel, no modules if you can avoid it. Anything you don't need, don't build in at all, as a module or as part of the kernel. Loading all those modules wastes time, especially when they aren't needed.

Also look at the init scripts section. (I hate the ubuntu init scripts methodology, Gentoo's is so much better.) You can disable it trying to bring up eth0 and other things that are useless to you.

[Carisma]

Originally Posted by MRD

Well, I do it all the time in Gentoo but I've never bothered in Ubuntu. The processes are slightly different, so I'd suggest you look up a guide on doing it in Ubuntu. There are probably hundreds out there.

Also, build everything you NEED into the kernel, no modules if you can avoid it. Anything you don't need, don't build in at all, as a module or as part of the kernel. Loading all those modules wastes time, especially when they aren't needed.

Also look at the init scripts section. (I hate the ubuntu init scripts methodology, Gentoo's is so much better.) You can disable it trying to bring up eth0 and other things that are useless to you.

I tried the init scripts and it didn't disable it. Maybe I did it wrong.

Looking at a guide now about building a kernel for Ubuntu. You are like one of the few people I have talked to lately that likes Gentoo... LOL

[MRD]

Once you learn Gentoo, you'll never use anything else, but it takes a bit of a learning curve. There are actually a lot Gentoo people here, but most of us don't recommend it to a totally new Linux user, as it's nowhere near as easy to get up and running as Ubuntu, which is very automatic.

The init scripts part of Gentoo is far more modern, simpler, and easier to use than the old System V init scripts methodology used by Debian and Ubuntu.

For example, for me to remove eth0 from startup, I would type rc-update del net.eth0 default. This removes net.eth0 from the default run level. With Ubuntu you have to do it all manually and remove a bunch of symlinks in different places that determine the different run levels' init scripts. Very annoying.

I believe someone actually wrote a program to manage it more automatically. It might be in synaptic, but I'm not sure what it's called.

[Carisma]

Wrote a program to manage what more automatically??? The "eth0" stuff?

I eventually want to get to Gentoo so I have something to work towards. Trust me I would rather it be something that challenges me because then I will feel good once I got everything up and running it is just no one wants to teach/help when I ask questions (friends that have been using Linux) because they know I was a Windows guy before (I broke my Windows CD when I got Ubuntu installed, so no more Windows for me).

Trust me if I could find a teacher or someone that can help when I need then I would do Gentoo but no one around me or that I talk to has it (well they all hate it).

So thank you MRD.

PS...love your avatar. I have a good background dealing with Linux.

[MRD]

Yes, there is a program to manage init scripts and run levels. I think. Again, I don't really use Ubuntu much, I just find Gentoo easier, so I may be wrong. Maybe one of the Ubuntu people can answer how they handle run levels and init scripts.

Essentially Linux has what are called run levels. When a computer starts up it goes to run level 1 and executes the scripts associated with that run level, then 2, etc. Different levels are associated with different functionality. In many distros, runlevel 3 is text only with no gui, while 5 is the full gui interface. 1 is pretty basic, no networking, etc.

You can add and remove init scripts from different run levels, which allows you to have multiple ways you run your system, some leaner and more basic than others. You can change run levels with the "init" command. init 0 is a shutdown, init 6 is a reboot, init 3 is (in many systems) a text only mode, etc. I think Ubuntu made a lot of the run levels the same from 3-5, but not sure.

[Carisma]

Oh okay. I will check those forums.

Also, it was a slow boot time before I even started anything like wireless or stuff. Basically straight from when the install finished and I rebooted, it has always been slow (on bootup and sometimes while I am in session).

Maybe I am missing something or had a bad CD (checked for errors and didn't find any).

[MRD]

It's slow because

1) It's trying to start up every possible piece of hardware, even those you don't have, because it's a modular kernel. This involves a lot of probing and module inserting. Strip all this from the kernel and it will be faster. Don't use modules at all when avoidable (I use one only, the nvidia binary module for 3d acceleration).

3) Init scripts you don't need. Remove them. They waste time.